Planning for Morocco

Three single cylinder 650s in the desert. What could go wrong?

I met Chris in 2013 at a biker bar down in the south of Spain. He’s a fellow F650.co.uk forum member and rides a Sertao that I don’t think has ever seen the rain. Based near Malaga he’s perfectly positioned to explore southern Spain and Morocco.

As turns out he was planning a trip to Morocco to ride the Plateau de Rekkam. Naturally I agreed to tag along. If nothing else, it’d be a good shake down test for the xCountry in preparation for a long term tour in Autumn.

Chris roped in another BMW F650 rider, and between us we shot the shit about the trip for months on Whatsapp. Three guys on BMW singles on tour in Morocco, what could possibly go wrong?

Well actually two guys. As we got into the business end of planning the third rider dropped out. Not to worry, shit happens, we’ll bring him back a souvenir.

Bike prep

I’d steadily been working through my list modifications since late 2014, so very little additional preparation was needed other than a basic service.

I stocked up spares, including a pair of fork seals after reading about a F800gs rider who had to turn back on the Plateau after blowing the seal and not being able to get a replacement in Morocco.

The choice of tyres was the subject of much debate. Chris wanted Heidenau K60s, for longevity. As we were sure to be travelling across some hard rocky surfaces I wanted the more puncture resistant Mitas E09 Dakar. We decided to compromise on the Continental TKC80. I decided to pack more spare tubes.

The route

As I was mostly tagging along, I left the route planning up to Chris. He insisted on my taking a Garmin GPS, though I believe a modern mobile phone and back up GPS receiver to be more flexible.

The route will take us over the Atlas for a play in the Saraha before tackling the Plateau de Rekkam.

Apparel

Of course no ‘lads’ tour is complete without a tour jersey. Thanks to Decathlon we got kitted out with these for around €9: